


fighting with friends

by unicyclehippo



Series: Critical Shorts [2]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: F/F
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-12-08
Updated: 2019-12-08
Packaged: 2021-02-26 03:13:21
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,434
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21716674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/unicyclehippo/pseuds/unicyclehippo
Summary: prompt request: "You need to stop."or, beau has been engaging in some dangerous behaviour and people care about her. she's not ready to hear that just yet
Relationships: Jester Lavorre/Beauregard Lionett
Series: Critical Shorts [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1824253
Comments: 6
Kudos: 142





	fighting with friends

'You need to stop.'

‘Huh? What are you talkin’ about, man?’

Fjord crouches beside her, there on the riverbank, and watches as she finishes carefully binding the wound, knotting the bandage in place. It’s awkward to do—the wicked slice is up near to her elbow and she has only the one hand to tie it.

‘Here, let me,’ he suggests after a moment. He reaches out for her hand. Stops when she pulls away a fraction. Despite the way his eyes go dark and quiet, like those deep currents they’d walked through on the ocean floor, so cold Beau had gone numb in an instant, his voice is gentle and smooth. ‘Maybe we should,’ he mutters.

Fjord looks back over his shoulder the way he had come and Beau is unsurprised to find Caduceus seated beneath a weeping willow, the curtain of falling leaves guarding their campsite. The firbolg sends a wide, warm smile their way and steps back within the hut, lets the curtain fall back with a dry swish of leaves.

‘Deuces sent you to practice some _radical honesty_?’ Beau asks. The harshness to the mocking tone is not new but it is unfamiliar. Jarring, in how long it has been since she has heard it, felt it drip like bile off her tongue.

He tries not to react to it but can’t quite hide the way he recoils; something in her face must catch his attention because he freezes for an instant and then leans right back in, heavy brow crinkling under a frown.

‘Yeah,’ he tells her, honest and simple. Messes it up a bit when he adds, ‘Sort of. No. He didn’t send me—I was already coming over when he gave me some advice.’

Beau grunts. She’s still fighting with the bandage and he slaps her fingers away—meets her glare with one of his own, and he can muster up a good one now and again—and takes over.

As he wraps the pinking scar and ties off the cloth with a practised knot, he continues, ‘I came over here to tell you to knock off the whole self sacrifice shit, but I don’t think you’re gonna listen to me.’

‘I’m not—‘

‘That’s what I thought,’ he nods. He ties off the knot, leans back. Beau examines the tie and, begrudgingly finding it adequate, watches Fjord as he makes himself comfortable next to her. Stretches his legs out until he is covered by the clear, cool water up to his knees. His heels sink into the silty sand, digging trenches behind them as he pushes them out deeper, and the silt swirls up and around his toes, grits between them. Muddied roots tickle beneath the soles of his feet, and he watches as a curious fish bobs nearby, only to scatter when he swirls a foot in its direction. ‘What happened between us?’

‘Huh?’

‘Come _on,_ Beau, you have to feel it too. It was you and me from the start, front line bros, Captain and first mate… And now you barely talk to me.’

Beau lifts a shoulder, shrugs. ‘I dunno.’

‘Bullshit. You’re the smartest person I know—‘

‘Caleb.’

‘Caleb is two books, a magic cat, and trauma wrapped up in a dirty coat,’ Fjord drawls. It doesn’t sound a thing like his old voice, and she doesn’t know why she’s stuck on it but she kind of is. ‘You’re a real one—a real shit kicker,‘ he adds with a laugh. ‘And smart. ‘Specially with that new headband. So forgive me if I don’t believe for a second that you don’t have _some_ idea.’

She can feel his attention on the side of her face. Waiting. Gritting her teeth, she says, ‘I don’t know.’

‘Right.’

Despite her non-answer, despite not talking to him, Fjord stays. After a long time, long enough for the sun to sink nearly beneath the distant mountains, he says, ‘Whatever it is—me, or something else—it doesn’t really matter. I just wanted to say that I can see it. The way you put yourself front line. Not like that’s new but lately it’s been more…reckless.’

He speaks carefully, like the conversation is trapped and he’s trying not to set something off. It’s not how she wants him to feel—even if they have been drifting apart—but she can feel her back start to grow stiff and tense with everything she doesn’t want, isn’t ready to talk about, to confront right now. The rest of her follows suit, preparing to fight, to defend herself, and she’s sure that Fjord with his ability to see even in these darkening shadows that bloom and wash across the world like it’s rolling up off the river itself, he can see it too.

‘I’m not judging you, I’m _worried_. Now more than ever we need to work as a team, and with you running ahead and picking fights with everything we encounter,’

‘Oh so it’s my fault we’re getting attacked by a death cult.’

‘That’s not what I’m saying!’ Nostrils flaring, Fjord takes a moment to breathe, calm himself. ‘Now, more than ever, we need to be careful. We need to trust each other,’

‘I trust you guys to get me back up onto my feet. You trust me to punch the shit out of them. What’s the problem?’

‘You aren’t listening to me,’ Fjord snaps, pulling his soaked feet out of the water. He stands when she does, pulling away, and he grabs at her uninjured elbow, pulls her gently to face her. She fights the urge to shake him off. ‘You’re scaring us, Beau! You’re taking too many risks, and it’s gonna get you killed. What is going on? Talk to me,’ he pleads, crouching a little in an effort to look into her eyes.

Hers is a mask of disinterest so profound that after a moment he draws back, confused, upset.

‘Did I do something?’ He thinks a moment. Eyes sliding up toward the hut. ‘Is this about Jester?’

‘What about Jester?’ she snaps, bristling. This time, she does shake his hand away from her.

‘I know you like her-‘

‘You don’t know the _first thing_ about me, Fjord,’ she spits with such malice it makes him physically recoil.

For a moment, it looks like he’s wavering between reassuring her that actually, yeah, he does. And a cruel little spirit in her twists and turns and Beau allows herself to fall back into bad habits.

‘You think you’re some kinda holy man now? Now that you have a pretty new sword and Caduceus standing at your shoulder? You want me to cry on your shoulder and all that bullshit, like you’re some wandering saviour, but it is Caduceus who gets mama Wildmother to hear you, it’s Caduceus who you’re mimicking now, just like you did dear old Vandren.’

Fjord jerks upright like he’s been slapped, colour draining from his cheeks. ‘Really?’ he snarls. ‘I knew you had a shitty childhood or whatever but attacking me the second I say I’m worried about you really isn’t the way to go. But hey, maybe you didn’t have a shitty childhood. Maybe it was all gold and roses! I don’t know,’ he snaps. ‘And whose fault is that? You don’t tell us anything about you!’

‘You never ask!’

‘Because you _push people away!_ Is letting people care about you so fucking terrifying that you can’t even fathom me being concerned for your safety? How fucking awful were you as a kid that even your own parents hated you?’

Beau reacts before she can think, something she thought she had grown out of. Her injured arm snaps up, grabs him by the front of his armour, and she _shoves_ him until he stumbles back, falling onto his ass in the black-yellow silt of the riverbank. When he tries to stand and follow, she moves forward so she’s standing over him.

The river flows gentle and slow, barely moving at all, and with the reflecting moonlight Beau can see her own reflection. Bent over him, finger pointed threateningly at him. There’s something wild in her eyes—not feral, not like she actually _wants_ to hurt him, but that look of something cornered, something that perceives even the helping hand coming toward it as an enemy.

She withdraws, drags in a ragged breath. With her uninjured hand, she wipes her loose hair back out of her eyes. Taking one and then another and another step back—like she recognises how _close_ she got to hitting him—she shakes her head. ‘Just leave me alone, Fjord.’

**Author's Note:**

> hi im unicyclehippo on tumblr as well, feel free to swing on by & say hi or send me a prompt x


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